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Jack Berry - Visiting Fiji with kids of Nakobo Village, Savusavu, Fiji - 2013 (picture via Jack Berry Fijian Foundation on Virgin Money Giving)Taxi driver who fell asleep at wheel jailed for killing cyclist
A taxi driver who crashed into three cyclists after he fell asleep at the wheel, killing one and seriously injuring the other two, has been jailed for three years, reports Wales Online.
Craig Gough, aged 36, pleaded guilty at Cardiff Crown Court last month to causing the death by dangerous driving of Jack Berry, 26, in October last year.
The court was told that Gough was on his way home after a 13-hour night shift when the fatal collision happened near Cowbridge shortly after 7am on the morning of 28 October 2017.
Mr Berry, a former soldier who had become a chef after leaving the army, had been saving to open his own pub.
He was out for a ride with his employer Andrew Hooker and a friend, Matthew Simmonds, both of whom needed hospital treatment for their injuries.
The trio had been riding in single file with Mr Berry at the rear when Gough struck them. The driver did not stop immediately but instead continued to the brow of the hill before turning his vehicle around and returning to the scene.
The prosecution said that the three cyclists would have been visible to Gough for 15 seconds before he crashed into them but he made no attempt to slow down or alter his steering.
Kelly Huggins, prosecuting, said: “The witness accounts from other motorists clearly showed that the cyclists had appropriate lighting, reflective clothing and safety equipment.
“They were experienced cyclists who had taken proper measures to be safe but those measures were not enough.
“Gough’s loss of concentration while behind the wheel had tragic consequences.
”We hope that the injured cyclists make a full recovery and our thoughts are with the family and friends of Mr Berry.”
Sentencing Gough, Judge Eleri Rees said: “No sentence passed by this court can reflect the loss of life or lessen the grief of those who have lost a loved one in such a manner.”
She added: “These were experienced and well-equipped, careful cyclists. The obvious conclusion from all the evidence is that you did indeed fall asleep.”
The money Mr Gough had been saving to start his own business is now being used, together with funds raised by family and friends following his death, to open a school in his memory in his wife’s home village in her native country, Fiji.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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13 comments
Got the two fingers from a taxi driver this morning on the motorbike. My crime.....daring to ride in a straight line whilst they tried to pulled out of a junction on me but had to brake.
Bring on the google cars.
I'm a taxi driver and am massively in favour of tacho's, I can feel my driving deteriorate after 9hrs, and that's pretty much all I'll work, but I know how ridiculously long some of the work for, 16hrs straight followed by 3 hours break and another 10hrs. Sometimes it's just plain greed, and others are forced out of circumstance, but tachos need to be brought in ASAP for everyone's safety.
He'll have got a third off if pleading guilty at the earliest opportunity, I personally think that that is far too high, especially when evidence clearly show wrong doing and you were bang to rights.
After all unless you had proof of wrongdoing by another then it is encumbent upon you not to harm another particularly as you are in charge of what is a killing machine/weapon that can and does kill every single day in the hands of humans.
I do understand that that it's seen as a way to cut down costs and undue distress for families but actually sometimes families want everything to come out so they can get their heads around it all armed with greater facts and to see the guilty party go through some public humiliation too.
I'm sure the government has spent thousands of hours looking at all the deaths and serious injuries of cyclists and pedestrians and come up with methods to address that serious problem, to come up with more stringent laws and sentencing to ensure society is better protected from these killers, oh wait, it's only focussed on the group that actually kills the least out of road users!
This time, less of a defence strategy, more of a prosecution one.
The worry is that he could be legally behind the wheel again in only 6 years.
I recall seeing a statistic which stated that cyclists are more likely to be killed in a collision with a taxi than with any other motorised vehicle other than skip lorries (adjusting for their relative prevalence). Despite all the justified fuss about HGVs, taxis are more dangerous. The drivers work very long hours without a break (one reason why the London taxi drivers association opposes tachographs on taxis, despite being a legal requirement for HGVs), and they perform dangerous manouvers to drop off and pick up passengers or take short cuts.
Bear all that in mind next time taxi drivers lobby against cycle lanes or other cycle protections
I got shouted at the other day with the words "i've been driving longer than you so I know i'm right". This was from a Hackney Carriage after he came onto my lane without indicating or giving enough space when overtaking. Apparently, I 'have' to cycle in the cycle lane despite the fact that i'd moved into the middle of the lane to get ready to take a right turn at the upcoming junction. Amazing.
A bus driver once told me the bicycle advance stop line meant cyclists should dismount and use the pedestrian crossings! This was after he had crept into the ASL and then cut me up forcing me into metal railings before immediately pulling into a stop.
I got the impression he really believed that to be the case.
I was so shocked by this, I wrote to the bus company, never got a response.
"appropriate lighting, reflective clothing and safety equipment."
bull fucking shit.
In the linked page it adds "A collision report found the weather was dry and the visibility was good ". Togehter I take that as reinforcement that not seeing them could only have come about by severe driving deficiencies.
There is no "safety equipment" that cyclists can wear which is any use in collision with a vehicle. What we need is for the drivers to stop killing us. I wonder how the government's inquiry into cycling safety is going, the one that's examining how they can stop cyclists killing pedestrians that is.
I wonder how they defined "appropriate" in this instance.
(Cough - cough - Michael Mason - cough - cough).
Out in 18 months...that's how much a life is worth!
Visible from 367m away and it's 96m to stop from 70.
5.5 year driving ban.